Elisabeth Kidd (13 page)

After a rest and a round of ale, the blacksmith and Mr. Markham raced, and again Markham won handily.

“The roan must be winded,” Dulcie said.

“So must be the cavalry horses,” Sabina countered. “They have all run several races. Only Mr. Markham’s black seems inexhaustible.”

She held her breath when Robert Ashton mounted his big charger. He looked as if he was enjoying himself immensely and responded with good humor to the jibes of his fellow officers and the encouragement of the crowd. He, too, was a local champion, Sabina realized, wondering how that had come to be.

Captain Ashton signaled his horse into a few turns that looked remarkably like a bow to the crowd, and the blacksmith called out, “Aye, m’lord, he can dance—but can he run?”

Markham laughed at that and shouted, “He’s seen through that trick, Robin! Show him what else you have up your sleeve!”

Ashton grinned and brought his horse up to the starting mark with no further displays of virtuosity. The race was over in a minute, but to Sabina, holding her breath, it seemed to take an eternity.

The two riders left the start at the same instant and stayed together for the first quarter of the course. Then Captain Ashton, on the inside, pulled ahead briefly before being overtaken in the third quarter. Just before the finish line, the captain put on a burst of speed, but so did the blacksmith, and in the end it was Jack Belfield’s muscular roan that won by a nose.

The crowd cheered both riders around the track again in a triumphal march, which the horses seemed to enjoy as much as their riders. Dulcie held out her hand, and Sabina put two shillings into it. She looked up again and thought she saw Robert Ashton wink at her. Doubtless she was mistaken, she told herself. Just as she was mistaken in thinking that he had deliberately held back a fraction of a second at the finish to let the blacksmith finish first.

* * * *

“So you see my difficulty,” Robert said to Viscount Markham as they made their way homewards that evening, laden with honors and good will and numerous toasts from the villagers.

Mr. Trent and Mr. Williams had elected to spend the night in the village, having been invited to any number of local entertainments by the other participants in the races, but Markham had professed a preference for the comfortable bed he had been given the previous night at Ashtonbury Abbey. Declaring that he must be getting soft now he was a civilian again, his companions agreed to meet him at the Feathers early the next morning to resume their journey to Wales.

“What I could see was that she is every bit as stubborn as you are,” Markham said on hearing his friend’s tale of his unlucky courtship. “Much better-looking, of course. A real stunner, in fact.”

Robert smiled. “I’ll concede that readily enough. And I’m afraid her stubbornness is a family trait, particularly well developed in her.”

He outlined the history of The Quarrel to the viscount, who declared it to be a great deal of botheration over dead people and dead issues, but Robert assured him that it was far from moribund.

“Her father had wanted to make peace, and I had hoped myself to win Sabina by somehow resolving the differences between our families. But her loyalty is stronger than her reason, and I am not willing for her to blame me for what she would consider a betrayal of her family—which is how marriage to me must appear to her.”

“There must be some way to win fair—if stubborn—maid. It does seem that she has some feeling for you.”

“She does that, but just now it is so far from love that I fear it will be near impossible to turn it in that direction. A resolution of The Quarrel would certainly make our future life together more comfortable. Neither of us would need to be estranged from our families, and it must be a good thing if other members of both families got along—or at least spoke with one another. However, I am prepared to abandon my family if I must—excepting my nephews, but that is another problem altogether.”

“There ought to be a way to do both,” Markham said. “Mend the quarrel
and
woo fair maid.”

“So I thought, but how? Do I leave her be and hope she sees the error of her ways, or go after her?”

“I’ve never known you to turn your back on a challenge, Robin. I’d say, think of it as a military campaign. Plan your attack carefully—and spring it quickly.”

“Aye, general. If only I could think of a plan of battle.”

“Make her jealous.”

“With whom? There’s no one else in the neighborhood who’d let me use her that way.”

“Oh, I don’t know. That little barmaid…”

“I’m sorry I asked.”

They emerged from a wood just then and Markham, spotting a clear field before them, called out “Cavalry, charge!” before setting his horse to a gallop and leaving his friend in his dust. Robert wasted no time in taking up the challenge, but was not surprised to reach the end of the field well behind the other man.

“Unfair!” Robert called, laughing. “You cheated.”

“Of course I did. I can win over almost anyone except you, so I must take what advantage I can. Anyhow, what can you do? Report me to my commanding officer?”

“I shall put a notice in all the papers.”

“That won’t tell anyone anything they don’t know already.” He stroked his horse’s neck and whispered loving words in the black’s ear. It twitched expressively, and Robert would have sworn the horse understood him.

“I say, look there, Robin—what river is that?”

Robert looked down from the rise they were standing on and smiled. “That’s no river, that’s the Grand Union Canal.”

“You don’t say. Didn’t you tell me you had been putting in manual labor at some lock? I knew there was a sparsity of serious amusements in these parts, but I thought that was going a bit far for a little fun.”

“Come down with me,” Robin said. “I’ll show you the results of my labors and make you jealous.”

Markham took up that challenge as well, and before long was being introduced to the Theaks and given a tour of the boat and lock. He teased Rose about her apple cheeks, making her blush, and went out of his way to be deferential to George. Bill, of course, he was already acquainted with, and the two reminisced over a cup of cider about their adventures in Spain, some of which put Robert to the blush.

The sun was well down towards the horizon before they tore themselves away, Robert saying they would offend his sister-in-law if they were late to dinner again. Rose got a little of her own back by declaring that the viscount could doubtless charm any hostess out of taking offense at anything he did, but Markham conceded that Lady Kimborough might be an exception to this rule, and bade his present hostess a fond good-bye.

On the remainder of their journey, Markham expressed his delight at meeting the Theaks, but Robert found that his friend had not forgotten their earlier conversation in the course of the afternoon’s bonhomie either.

“There are other ways to make her jealous than of another woman,” he observed after they had ridden along for some way in companionable silence.

Robert turned his head. “What do I have that she does not? That she could possibly envy?”

“You’d know that better than I. Think about it. If she came to believe she would be missing something rare—other than your charming person, of course—she might be more willing to consider overlooking your innumerable faults.”

Robert was silent for a few moment and then said, “You may be right.”

“I’m always right,” said the viscount confidently. “You can expect me back through here a month from now—and I’ll expect
you
to be at least betrothed by then!”

Chapter 9

In the days following the village fête, Sabina found it impossible to return to the uncaring, unthinking state she had forced herself into following her return from Market Harborough. Instead she indulged in melancholy thought and futile self-recrimination, relieved only by wistful daydreams of what might have been.

Early in the morning, before her mind was fully awake, she drifted happily in that state between sleeping and waking, where she seemed able to transport herself easily back to the canal and the narrowboat. There she saw Rose and Bill Theak and heard the birds’ call from the bank and smelled the coffee brewing in the painted tin pot Rose used.

And there was James Owen, watching lovingly over her. She smiled in her sleep and then, only reluctantly when Emily knocked tentatively on her door, put aside her dream and rose to another endless day.

But even the prosaic events of a day at home could not prevent her from seeing reminders in every cloud and tree of her time on the boat. And of her time with James Owen.

He had been so considerate when she was ill, and then so gentle when he looked into her eyes and said he loved her. But no—he had not actually said so. Had he? She racked her memory, but on this matter it was indeed faulty.

She did remember that he had drawn back from making any commitment to their future together until she had regained her memory. Surely that indicated some consideration on his part for her vulnerable state. And she did remember that he had kissed her—or had she kissed him? She felt her face grow warm with the memory. How brave she had been when she did not know what courage was!

I wish we could be together like this always
, he had said as they stood together on the narrowboat that day. James Owen had said that—only hours before Robert Ashton betrayed her.

She could not yet bring herself to think of James Owen as being one and the same with Robert Ashton, although when that name entered her consciousness, it no longer automatically aroused anger or resentment in her. Perhaps, if she could keep that lack of emotion about him, she might be able to do something to break this stalemate that was rendering her incapable of action. She could not be herself again if she continued to mope about like this. She certainly could not wait for him to suggest a next step—
his
future, after all, was not at stake.
He
could resume his old life with perfect ease.

He had not tried to communicate with her, either, which must prove that he had no intention of apologizing for his deceit.
I’m sorry, Miranda
. Very well, she would give him that. He had called out to her as she hurried to get away from him at that shop in Market Harborough, and she had not stopped to hear more. She supposed she ought to take the next step, but how? How could she apologize without abasing herself, without laying herself open to further hurt?

The answer came to her one evening, just as she had blown out the candle by her bed.

Of course! He could not refuse. It was the only solution. Her mind whirled with the possibilities, and she thought she would never be able to sleep this night for thinking about how she would present them to him. But within half an hour, she was deep in blissful unconsciousness.

* * * *

She spent more time in carrying out her decision than in making it. First she must think of a neutral place for them to meet—she would not go to Ashtonbury Abbey, so she could not ask him to come to Bromleigh Hall, and she most certainly would not meet him on the canal. Not there, not where the memories would rise up like ghosts to haunt her.

Her mind’s eye roamed over the nearby country and then lighted on the perfect place. This problem solved, she spent an hour writing and tearing up letters, finally settling on the simplest of polite requests:

Dear Captain Ashton:

I would be grateful for a word with you. I shall ride out to Carling tomorrow and hope to meet you on the path near Michael’s Bridge at noon.

Yours,

Sabina Bromley

This missive dispatched, she then put the matter from her mind as settled. She must face yet another endless day before she saw him, but this, she was surprised to find, was suddenly less of a chore.

She called Emily to help her with her hair, and the little maid, apparently taking this interest in her appearance as a sign that her mistress was herself again, chattered away as she plied brush and comb. Her mind elsewhere, Sabina scarcely heard, but smiled and agreed at appropriate places so that Emily was then able to report to Mrs. Woodruff that all was well with Lady Sabina, and “before you know it, there’ll be no holding her back and we can fret about her just as we used to.”

Sabina, having arrayed herself to her satisfaction in a black-and-white striped day dress with a black collar, went looking for something to do. She found Georgina and Dulcie in the family parlor, a bow-windowed room which looked out over the home wood and was pleasantly sunny today. The two ladies were engaged in mixing potpourri, and their table was covered with bowls of dried rose petals, narcissus, spices, and herbs.

“Oh, hullo, Sabina,” Georgina said, glancing up. “Here, smell this.”

Sabina obliging put her nose into the bowl Georgina held up to her, which contained an array of petals.

“Too delicate,” she pronounced. “It won’t keep its fragrance very long.”

“Oh, dear,” Georgina lamented, “I was afraid that was so. I shall have to add some cloves, much I dislike to do so. But it is a pleasant fragrance, is it not?”

Sabina agreed that a cologne of that particular recipe would be very agreeable.

“I shall make a note of the mixture, Georgie, before you discard it,” Dulcie said. “I have been meaning to purchase some fresh oils and elixirs to mix special perfumes for all of us—us ladies, that is to say, although I daresay Randolph would help us if we gave him some. What do you think, Sabina?”

Sabina pulled a chair up to the table and said that was a splendid idea for Christmas gifts. She joined in the mixing and, grateful that neither lady had made any remark about either her absence or her apparent recovery, was able to laugh and exchange silliness with them comfortably for another hour.

When Georgina stood up, stretched, and said she simply must get some exercise or she would grow too fat to fit into her new clothes, Sabina offered to go for a walk with her.

“Oh, good,” Georgina said. “You know all the paths, and you don’t dawdle. I need a brisk trot today.”